Before I start expressing my feelings about this forum, I want everyone to know that I love SketchUp to the point of no return.
Today, I receive a message telling me to stop posting topics where I announce my SketchUp programming tutorials on my Blog. Something about being against the forum guidelines to post links which drives people away from this forum.
On the other hand, I see the author of the message self-promoting blogs or podcasts but not giving others (me) which want to attract more people to SketchUp do so as well. I also see people promoting all the time without the flag boogeyman silent them. Too much double standards in my opinion. By the way, I commented on the post where this person was promoting and it got flagged as well so who knows if this gets it as well.
If you are in any way referring to the recently flagged post in the SketchUp Podcast thread:
Then I’m with whoever flagged it. Why? Because your post was completely off topic - a clear violation of the forum guidelines.
If you think Trimble promoting its own products and informing it’s user’s about new and interesting offerings on a forum that they own, pay for, and support constitutes a “double standard” in that they choose to discourage others from profiting without contributing substantially to the discussion, you have the right to that opinion. But I think you’re wrong.
Off topic according to you perhaps, but not to me. They were promoting their blog and I just commented the following… “Self-promotion is a thing of beauty, I love double bias. ”
It was a comment to let the people who’re running the forum know that I don’t agree with their ethics.
Shame that SketchUp doesn’t want to give exposure to a small blog like mine which is meant to help new programmers make more awesome extensions for SketchUp.
45% of the referrals to my blog came from this forum and now I can’t even post when I have got a new tutorial up on the Extension API forum topic?
I don’t mind them posting promotions about their podcast which I think is great but cmon my Blog is no threat to this forum.
One more thing… I am not charging money to write my tutorials! SHAME SHAME ON YOU SKETCHUP!
Now I may have to close my blog because of you, so hope you’re happy! Hope your blog and podcast is successful because at the end is all about you and not your users!
You shouldn’t have done that @indie3d … you’ve overwritten your original message in that thread, and Now, No One can ever read it.
I never saw it, so I can’t weigh in one side or the other here. But perhaps, maybe, I might have agreed with you… had the original message still been there and left intact. [… if you see what I mean.]
That message was flagged, but NOT censored into oblivion—it was still readable—one just had to click on the flag in order to make it appear again.
Moving forward from here… your best bet is too forget about it. This shouldn’t be the battle you waste time fighting. If you’re passionate about teaching folks to write plugins for SU, then continue on that course. I thought it was a good idea, and there is enough of a market for it to make a certain amount of sense.
It didn’t seem like anyone was stopping you, or limiting your main announcement threads. It’s probably best to just keep any discussions self-contained within them.
Without having looked in detail on this specific situation and without wanting to judge,
I have also done things for free, but take care not to appear self-promoting. Humbleness is rewarding in its own. Of course it is hard to find the right balance, especially since a creator rightly has an interest to make the result of his work noticed by people. But one often sees the situation only from one’s own perspective.
Doesn’t this sound a bit childish and unprofessional? Cool down, it is not the world’s end.
Situation is that once a week I planned to make a programming tutorial and post a notice on the Ruby API topic section. I did this by writing a paragraph of what we were going to learn and then a link to the full tutorial. But, after my third post I was alerted that my post was flagged/censured and for not posting anymore.
Mind you that I have been dealing with my content being flagged many times. Here is few discussion brought in the past…
I mean I should earn a badge for most flags earned! (joke)
I acknowledge me being little childish but I am truly frustrated by this situation. I can’t post about my passion which is SketchUp without someone censuring me. Maybe I should post a whiter version of me in the profile picture!..(That was totally a joke, hope no one think I am serious).
Anyways, what should I do, never post my tutorial for my Blog?
I know you are a developer @Aerilius, how would you feel if you could not share your extensions in this forums because someone flags it?
I simply don’t share (all) my extensions here (people find them on EWH anyways or by using there favorite search engine), so I cannot really say how I would feel.
Regarding flags, flags in the Discourse forum are not what flags are elsewhere. They are markers (with reason/message) that are a highly useful tool to notify moderators: “Hey, take a look, I feel … about this post, what do you think?”
All of this thought process in the background is not visible to users, who easily perceive a flag as an insult although it is not. It is a misnamed feature (just like “git blame”).
From those who may have actually suffered from racism… dealing with the reality of it’s harsh consequences and demeaning brutality… the least they should be able to do IS joke about it.
All my post have been deleted and I am no longer a premium member which Rich O Brien so kindly honored me with years ago.
@DaveR I suspect your behind all of this, what is your problem?
Also, I was planning to learn the licencing API from SketchUcation to re-upload my plugins to the Extension Store but I lost my Developer access as well!
Next week I am going for vacation so this doesn’t keep stressing me out!!!
Sketchucation’s site was totally down yesterday. They’re either having problems or upgrading something. I’ve lost a whole thread there. I’ve lost my premium membership. Hopefully this will be sorted out soon. Your problems over there are extremely unlikely to have anything to do with your arguments here or with Dave.
It’s going to be over my dead body that I allow DaveR to lay claim for being a Super Villain,… too!!!
There are others much more deserving of this honor, and I’ll humbly include myself in this category. Perhaps I stand behind Box (if he wants it), or ThomThom (evilsoftwareempire.com)… in that I’m not quite crafty enough just yet.
But that’s not the point here… DaveR has already reached his maximum exposure for accolades earned. He’s a SUSage, and Furniture Modeling Guru, and I think he knows how to plug in a life support machine.
He’s just not cut out for the super villain life style. Obtaining Super Villain status isn’t a well earned profession, achieved through hard work… You get there in part by being cunning, and devious, and having your personal assistant running around in an attempt to sabotage the efforts of all others.
In effect, as displayed in the actions of Professor Fate; If you can’t win by cheating—then winning the race by any other means simple doesn’t count at all… and thus, The race needs to be held again.
Case Closed!!!
Now, I need to go perfect my SU model of the Professor Fate Mobile, his Rocket, and his Submarine for that matter.
Rafael, you need to calm down and realize a few things.
First, the people that you are complaining to about censorship and flagging are the very people who are flagging your posts. This is a user moderated forum. While we do have a few staff members who spend time on here, most moderation is done by our members. Not a single one of your posts was called out by a staff member, but by another member of this community.
Second, we are not in the censorship business. We do, however, have a few rules that are aimed at making this forum a healthy, friendly, and convenient place for people to come to get help and learn about SketchUp. One of our rules asks users not to post advertisements. Advertising posts are posts that are intended to sell a product to take users away from this site to another. This is the reason, for example, that we ask that tutorials placed into the Tutorial section include the steps actually be displayed in the topic, rather than just linking off to a tutorial on another page. We are lenient with this. We do allow extension developers to maintain a thread in the Extension section with information about their extension. You have had many posts that have been flagged by users that exist only to divert the read off to your own page. We have no problem with you posting a link to your page as answer to someones question, but we ask that you not start topics that are just links to your page.
I should also point out that we have no problem with you having your own SketchUp related website. In fact, many companies would as that you not use their trademarked name or logo on your page. We don’t do that. We like to see people using our software and talking about it. The last thing that we want to see is your site failing, but we can’t ignore our stance on advertising, just so that you can get traffic.
Finally, what we will NOT stand for, is anyone making disparaging remarks or lashing out at our members. You have made some inappropriate accusations about both SketchUp and our users. This is unacceptable and needs to stop. Hopefully you have gotten what you need to say off your chest. We see you as a valuable member of this community, but posts like the ones you have made lately are unacceptable.
Don’t agree with that statement because I don’t think we can generalize the community plotting to take down my posts. I believe this is a small group of people who don’t agree developer should profit from their work and have targeted me to intimidate other developers. Not sure they’re part of the Illuminati but who knows (joke).
Not knowing who takes down my forum topics leaves me barking at the wrong tree sometimes. But, even though I can be an ignoranus towards some, I am a fan of their work.
The last post I saw was someone proudly announcing a book he publishes about SketchUp and he posted a link to where people can buy it. According to the rules, this post should be removed effective immediately because its an advertisement.
By the way, I don’t agree his post should be removed at all. To the contrary, the community should celebrate his accomplishment and your podcast should promote people who are contributing valuable content.
But, by not eliminating his post, now some might say we are cherry picking here and that is not fair is it?
Also, mind you I don’t directly sell my tutorials but I do have affiliate products that I recommend and my SketchUp extensions can be bought if they want but tutorials are free. I can’t offer all my extensions for free because I still have to pay a monthly fee to keep the site running.
You almost gave me a stroke when reading this. Would you tell the book publisher to write all the content of his book in the forum instead of the book?
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Anyways. you wrote a lot an I need to take a break, but I do appreciate that one of the SketchUp team member cared enough to reply to me.
P.S. I seem to be responsible for a new supervillain meme being born. I know @DaveR is very very very mad at me and probably will never accept my apology but at least I tried…Cheers!
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